Wednesday, May 13, 2015

On May 6–8, Armenian
President Serzh Sargsyan, along with the Minister of Foreign Affairs Edward
Nalbandian and Supreme Patriarch and Catholicos of all Armenians Garegin II, paid
a working visit to the United States (President.am, May 6). Not counting Sargsyan’s
previous visit in September 2014 to attend the 69th session of the United
Nations General Assembly, in New York City, this was the Armenian head of state’s
first official trip to the US in five years. Sargsyan held a meeting with top
US lawmakers, including Mitch McConnell, the Republican Majority Leader of the Senate,
and Harry Reid, the Senate’s Democratic Minority Leader. They touched upon the
importance of parliamentary cooperation between Armenia and the United States and
emphasized US support in the development of Armenia’s economy, civil society
and democratic governance. Additionally, President Sargsyan and the senators
stressed the US engagement in the Karabakh peace process within the framework
of the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe’s (OSCE) Minsk Group.
On May 6, the Armenian president also had a separate meeting with the US Minsk
Group Co-Chair James Warlick (President.am, May 6).

The key result of
the working visit, however, was the signing of the bilateral Trade and Investment
Framework Agreement (TIFA) by Foreign Minister Edward Nalbandian and Assistant
US Trade Representative Daniel Mullaney (Mfa.am, May 7). As Ken Hachikian, the
Chairman of the Armenian National Committee of America (ANCA), argued, the
bilateral trade and investment agreement promises to improve Armenia’s
investment climate, identify priority growth areas, build trade capacity, increase
the transparency of governmental processes related to imports and exports,
expand agricultural trade and investment, as well as grow the level of trade in
services, including banking, insurance and tourism (Armenianweekly.com, May 5).
Reportedly, the intensification of US-Armenian trade relations will be
coordinated by a special council that will convene at least once a year.

Indeed, this
contract will bolster bilateral cooperation and the political dialogue. In the
words of ANCA Executive Director Aram Hamparian, the agreement is a “win-win
for US-Armenia economic relations” (Armenianweekly.com, May 5). The TIFA should
be regarded as the “second wave” of recent US economic engagement in Armenia.
Back in 2014, the US company ContourGlobal reached a $250 million deal to
purchase the 405-megawatt Vorotan Cascade hydropower project—which is, in fact,
the biggest single US investment in Armenia’s energy sphere. Therefore, the
newly granted opportunities opened up by the TIFA may prepare the ground for
further US economic representation in Armenia, as well as in the wider South
Caucasus. Similarly, Armenia will now be in a better condition to reinforce its
existing trade turnover with the US as well as diversify its domestic economy. Though
Armenia’s membership in the Eurasian Economic Union (EEU) led to the delegation
of a part of the country’s economic sovereignty to the EEU’s supra-state
bodies, the TIFA will still serve as an impetus for potentially far-reaching
perspectives in US-Armenian political and economic relations.

Directly following
his working visit to Washington, President Sargsyan flew to Moscow in order to
attend a session of the EEU’s Supreme Eurasian Economic Council and the events
dedicated to the 70th anniversary of the victory in the Great
Patriotic War (President.am, May 8). The fact that the working visit to the US
was immediately followed by a trip to Russia served, indeed, as a unique
message both to Russia and the United States—and, to some extent, to Europe.
Obviously, arriving in Moscow and watching the joint military parade of several
national armed forces (including Armenian) with Vladimir Putin and other heads
of state shows Armenia’s traditional close ties to Russia. On the other hand,
the two-part trip means that despite Yerevan’s membership in the EEU and the
seeming imbalance in Armenia’s “East-West” relations, Armenian authorities aspire
to develop the “Western direction” of the state’s foreign policy. The signing
of a strategic trade agreement with the United States signaled just such an
effort.

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